South Africa

I loved South Africa. Cape Town is an amazing city with so much to offer. I spent two days there and didn’t even get to half of the things I wanted to see. The majority of my time in South Africa was spent on safari, we went to a private game reserve called Kapama and stayed at the River Lodge that was built only two years ago. The food, the people, the scenery, the accommodations were all top notch. To get there we took a plane to Johannesburg and then got on a historic DC-4 built in 1947 that brought us to Hoedspruit which is about 10 minutes by Land Rover to the lodge. Flying on the DC-4 was unforgettable. The pilot said that we’re welcome to use our cell phones during the flight, because there was no electronic instrumentation to interfere with. He also told us that it was normal for the old engines to leak oil, but if they stopped leaking oil then we should let him know. On our safari we saw four out of the big five, missing the leopard, as well as many other exotics. We got up each morning with a five a.m. wakeup call, tea was at five-thirty and we left at six for our morning game drive. During the morning drive we would stop for tea after a few hours and then be back around nine for breakfast. We had free time to nap or sit by the pool during the day and lunch around one. After that there was another tea time at four-thirty before our evening drive. During the evening drive we had a cocktail break around sunset and were back for dinner at eight. Upon reflection I think I could really get used to the vicious routine of eating opportunities. I know, I know you want to hear about the animals. We saw lions, cheetahs, elephants, rhino, buffalo, zebra, giraffe, kudu, impala, warthogs, springbuck, vultures, and many others. Lions were by far the most exciting to see, it was awesome seeing all their powerful features and confident gaze. We eventually returned to Cape Town were I went to the company gardens, as in the Dutch East India Company, in the older part of the city. It was really cool seeing all of the old world architecture in the middle of Africa. It's going to be really tough for another country to beat South Africa, but I'm excited to see what happens.